[JURIST] On Friday, Amnesty International (AI) [advocacy website] called upon [press release] members of the UN to demand Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir [BBC profile; JURIST news archive] turn himself in to the International Criminal Court (ICC) [official website; JURIST backgrounder] where he faces charges for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide allegedly committed during the Darfur conflict [BBC backgrounder]. Al-Bashir has continually ignored the charges against him [case materials] and is still being protected by the Sudanese government. AI is calling for the international community to come together in cooperation with the ICC in order to bring al-Bashir to justice. Despite the warrants for his arrest, al-Bashir has reportedly applied for a US visa in order to attend the 68th session of the UN General Assembly in New York.

This is the latest development in the on-going attempt to arrest al-Bashir. The ICC has faced difficulties in enforcing its arrest warrant against al-Bashir, in part because of the lack of support by neighbor states. In July, the ICC urged [JURIST report] Nigeria to arrest al-Bashir while he was in their jurisdiction. In June 2012 former ICC chief prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo said that economic of other aid should be refused [JURIST report] to those countries that assist al-Bashir in evading the arrest warrant that was issued against him in 2010. The ICC reported Kenya [JURIST report] and Chad [decision, PDF] in August 2010 for failing to arrest al-Bashir when he visited those country. In July 2010 the ICC charged [JURIST report] al-Bashir with three counts of genocide.